


a tattoo that engraced the predictions of fate

by moodyme



Series: The Magic of the Shining Skies [5]
Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: Astronaut!Adam, I posted this with the worng ship tagged initially cause i am a loser, I'm Sorry, Just the absolute worst, M/M, Not Canon Compliant, Tattoos, pretty fluffy guys ngl, two dorks in love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-02
Updated: 2019-11-02
Packaged: 2021-01-16 21:14:43
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,072
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21277829
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/moodyme/pseuds/moodyme
Summary: Ronan, and his tattoos.Can be read as a stand-alone, I think.





	a tattoo that engraced the predictions of fate

**Author's Note:**

> Written for an anon prompt on tumblr that I decided last minute to include in this series. Thank you for reading!!!  
Also, hey, of you are reading this without reading the rest of the series, just know that is this au, Adam is an astronaut for NASA and Opal is his and Ronans adopted daughter.
> 
> Title taken from a translation of the Sailor Moon song 'Moon Revenge'.

The first tattoo Ronan Lynch had ever gotten was a monstrous and twisted and dark thing that was stabbed into his skin by several thousand painful pricks of a needle hours after the worst day of his life.

It was a reflectaion of how he felt in those days. All his emotions encapsulated by the snarling image that covered his back. The tattoo was also a giant "Fuck you" to his older brother, said more eloquently than anything any dictionary could formulate.

There had been other tattoos over the years. Smaller ones, though not necessarily less important. The crown of pink roses for his mother over his right arm that he got on the first anniversary of her death. A tiny mint leaf on his ankle that he got after getting too drunk on vodka and losing a bet with Cheng (who ended up also getting the tattoo which Ronan complained about for weeks afterwards because it defeated the whole purpose of the stakes of the bet). A dagger on his calve that had no real meaning other than he was bored and thought it would be badass.

Adam, at some point in the last few months they spent between getting engaged and finally getting married, had jokingly laughed when Ronan would get a tattoo for him. Because he had Gansey's mint leaf, and Cheng's even smaller bee atop his dagger, and Blue's zodiac constellation on his left arm, and below that, a tiny cartoon smiling ghost for Noah, and Matthew's and Declan's dates of birth near Aurora's rose crown.

Ronan had laughed, said, "There ain't a tattooist in the whole world that could make something for you."

"Oh, what," Adam had said around a smile, "You couldn't just get them to put my initials over your heart?"

Ronan spent the next thirty minutes trying (and somewhat failing) to convince Adam he hadn't been considering just that.

(He never got the initials. Adam, who hadn't known he had just guessed correctly with a joke, had said it was too cliche. Ronan had disagreed and almost gotten it anyway. Probably would have if Henry Cheng, in a moment of remarkble timing, hadn't earnestly suggested he do just that a mere few hours before his appointment at the tattoo shop. He ended up keeping the appointment, got one over his ribs that said 'Drochubh, drochéan' instead.)

He wasn't the only one with tattoos. He listened for hours as Adam talked about the people whose names were on his own arms. Ronan would sometimes stroke over the wings that accomanied each name during those nights when Adam couldn't, or wouldn't, sleep for the memories behind them.

The next day Ronan would always be just that extra bit thankful that Adam had stayed with NASA.

Not long after Opal came home to them, he got another tattoo. 

He had let her pick what he got, had silently watched as she drew something on a sheet of paper, her expresion serious. He wasn't sure if she understood that a tattoo was a (for him anyway) permanent thing. Figured it was probably better if she didn't. Something about the stress of permanency inhibiting artistic freedom or something.

When she was done, she very seriously told him what it was. He couldn't quite make out what she said, something something bear something something Daddy (or, possible 'jaffy' which he was sure meant something to her but was a mysterious word to him) and something something cookie. He had nooded along, expresion matching her's on somberness. Complimented her art when she was done, and thanked her.

The finished work that spread over his left collarbone and chest was a kind of Rorchsach test. Everyone who saw it saw something different. Ronan insisted to each of them that it was (very possibly) him as a bear holding a cookie.

It was also the only tattoo he got where he cried during the process. Not necessarily because it hurt. It was painful, yes, but it wasn't the pain that had him tearing up in the tattoo chair.

It wans't until years after they were married that he finally got his tattoo for Adam. He had been fucking about one of the weeks they spent at the Barns each summer when he happened to glance down and notice his wedding band was missing.

The following hours were filled with a growing sense of dread as he realized his ring was well and truly lost. He had searched everywhere for it, retraced his steps, racked his brain trying to remember where he could have lost it. All in vain. His ring was gone.

Adam found him in one of the disused barns, angry and sad and frustrated.

He had dragged him back to the house, wrapped his arms around him, promised to get him another ring, kissed his forehead, stroked his hands across his back and through the short hairs of his shaved head and over his knuckles.

Ronan allowed himself to be comforted. Eventually let his breathing even. Plastered on a smile that didn't quite reach his eyes.

The replacement ring was finished the next week, a perfect match to the one he lost. 

Except. Except, he knew he could possibly lose this one too. And maybe it was silly or childish or whatever. But. He hated that thought. Hated those seven days he spent looking down at his ring finger and seeing. Nothing.

At some point after getting married, he had taken to twisting the ring around his finger. It was both a nervous tick and a comfort mechanism, a reminder of Adam during his lonely moments. 

After a few months of wearing his new ring, he learned to love it as much as the original, but there was a feeling that he couldn't seem to fully shake.

Impermanence.

He knew, logically, that everthing he and Adam had between them weren't just those rings. The ties that bound them together was made of sterner stuff than that.

But. But he wanted something that he could carry with him always. Something that would be there even if he were to lose this ring as well.

When he showed Adam the simple, thin, black band he came home with tattooed on his ring finger, Adam had smiled knowingly and kissed the knuckle above the tattoo. Gripped his other hand, where his ring was temporarily worn while his skin healed, kissed that area as well.

**Author's Note:**

> Drochubh, drochéan - this basically kinda means 'if the child is bad, its the fault of the parent'.
> 
> The tattoo Ronan gets for Opal is inspired by the tattoo a friend got for their child.
> 
> Also, you just KNOW Adam ends up getting a wedding ring tattooed under his own ring. God these two are such saps.


End file.
